Read-Aloud

Declaring our work as art is a bold and arrogant thing to do. By doing so, were
saying that our work is beyond mere utility: its an expression of our humanity and
individuality. It may even be in the realm of the ineffable. Unfortunately, it may also
be an expression of our pretentiousness, but lets try not to worry about that for now.

Contemporary art is in flux. Old hierarchies and categories are fracturing; new
technologies are offering different ways of conceptualizing, producing, and showing
visual art; established art forms are under scrutiny and revision; an awareness of
heritages from around the world is fostering cross-fertilizations; and everyday culture
is providing both inspiration for art and competing visual stimulation.

The 2000s so far have been extremely violent. In September 2001 the World Trade
Center in New York was destroyed and the Pentagon in Washington, D.C., attacked
by Islamist terrorists. The United States-led invasion of Afghanistan commenced
later that fall, and in 2003, the United States led an invasion of Iraq that toppled the
government of Saddam Hussein.

The demographics of various parts of the world have changed dramatically since
1980. Just in the United States, the U.S. experienced a profound demographic shift
in the 1980s, with an influx of over 7 million immigrants from Latin America, the
Caribbean, and Asia. By 1990, 25 per cent of Americans claimed African, Asian,
Hispanic, or Native American ancestry.

The art scene exploded after 1980, with a marked increase in artists, dealers,
collectors, publications, and exhibition spaces. The formation of new institutions, as
well as new or revamped facilities at existing institutions, expanded the number, size,
and quality of locations where the latest in visual art could be seen by a growing
public, including tourists seeking entertainment.

The fortunes and misfortunes of contemporary artists take shape, to a large degree,
within the sphere of the commercial galleries that present new art. Reputations are
built by the support of prominent gallery dealers and the approval of the critics,
curators, and collectors who carefully monitor and judge the quality of the art
featured in highly publicized exhibitions.

Public dollars funded many public art activities, a fact that turned out to be something
of a double-edged sword. The support of contemporary art with government dollars
was a crucial means of enlarging the funds available to artists and institutions; in the
United States and Britain such support was often a percentage of the amount
budgeted for new government-funded public construction projects.
Drone footage is everywhere, whether used to film extreme sports, outdoor events,
nature, music festivals, or just for its own sake. Recreational aircraft such as quad-
copters, fixed-wing and mini drones are getting ever cheaper and easier to buy.

Crime dramas in film and television often focus on the value of forensic procedures
in solving crimes and convicting criminals. While this evidence is often portrayed as
almost infallible, a report released this month in the United States raises significant
doubts.

A handful of soil is a small and very complex ecosystem which includes soil particles,
pores, aggregates, organic matter and a staggering number of microorganisms, all of
which interact to keep the soil healthy and productive.

Studies have shown that determining the political leanings of Facebook users is
easy, even for those who refrain from online political activity. Facebook could
therefore deploy the I Voted tool selectively only for supporters of candidates or
political parties of its choosing, thereby amplifying only their votes. This, it should be
stated, would be legal, even if done covertly.

Ancient Celtic bards were famous for the sheer quantity of information they could
memorise. This included thousands of songs, stories, chants and poems that could
take hours to recite in full.

The early stages of human space activity coincided with a period of quite
considerable tension. The possibility of large scale and potentially highly destructive
military conflict between the space superpowers always lurked in the background.

With the release of the latest Apple Watch this month came a new Breathe app
which promises to help you better manage everyday stress. Giving mindful
breathing a place beside the alarm clock and weather app seems to prove
mindfulness has truly gone mainstream.

Earthquakes, including the tsunamis they generate, are Earths most fatal natural
hazard, accounting for approximately 55% of the more than 1.35 million disaster
deaths in the last two decades. The US Geological Survey predicts that more than
2.5 million people will die from earthquakes this century alone.

The discovery of these security flaws brought to light a relatively new, low-profile and
ethically questionable business: selling potent hacking tools, and information about
security flaws that make them effective, to government agencies and private
companies around the world.

More than any other species, human beings are gifted with the power to manipulate
their environment and the ability to accumulate and transmit knowledge across
generations. The first of these gifts we call technology; the other we call culture.
They are central to our humanity.

After millennia of development, the power to manipulate the environment has

become the power to destroy it, while the ability to transmit knowledge transmits as
well a legacy of hatred, injustice, and violence. Today, as both the destruction and
the violence reach a feverish crescendo, few can deny that the world is in a state of
crisis.

The dashed Utopian dreams of the last few centuries leave little hope. Despite the
miracles we have produced, people across the ideological spectrum, from Christian
fundamentalists to environmental activists, share a foreboding that the world is in
grave and growing peril. Temporary, localized improvements cannot hide the ambient
wrongness that pervades the warp and woof of modern society, and often our
personal lives as well.

At the dawn of the Industrial Revolution, it seemed obvious that the Age of Coal
would usher in a new era of leisure. In one industry after another, a machine was
able to do the work of a thousand men.

Philosophers of science will protest that it is already well-established, even in

conventional circles, that perfect knowledge and perfect control of the universe is
probably impossible, due to such things as mathematical incompleteness, quantum
indeterminacy, and sensitive dependence on initial conditions.

The bankruptcy of the ambition encoded in the words knowledge economy is now
becoming plain. Office work is no less tedious than that of the assembly line or
vegetable monofarmand for the same systemic reasons of standardization and
mass scale. Much of todays knowledge economy consists of data input.

The promise of Utopia just around the corner to justify todays sacrifices is a
common thread connecting every application of the Technological Program. We saw
it in the Age of Coal, we see it in the Computer Revolution today: We must undertake
the vast project of inputting all the data; then computers will run everything much
more efficiently.

Ironically, it was precisely these principles of logic, reason, and efficiency that were
supposed to elevate humanity to a more noble state, just as the technologies of
physical and chemical engineeringused in the world warswere supposed to
elevate humanity to a new level of material comfort, health, and security.

Whereas technology once promised a grand future of leisure and security, today we
need intensifying doses of it merely to keep the world from falling apart. A pattern of
diminishing marginal returns seems to have infiltrated all areas of technology,
whether material or social.
Early in the twentieth century, modest expenditures in medical research brought
enormous improvements in lifespan; today vast outlays barely succeed in
maintaining present standards. In agriculture, small amounts of chemical fertilizers
and pesticides once brought huge increases in crop yields.

Business competition has always been a prominent element in the landscape of

analysts, directors, entrepreneurs, executives, founders, managers, and planners,
among others. The challenges it presents remain dynamic, creating uncertainty and
sometimes its corresponding cousins of fear and doubt in business executives as
they seek to achieve their aims.

Nevertheless, what surprises us about business, competitive, market, and/or most

strategic analysis we see is the relatively limited number of tools and techniques
used by most practitioners; unsurprisingly, it is not a surprise about how little genuine
insight emanates from them.

Competitive in a business or commercial sense means that a contest is occurring

between two or more parties. The sources of this can be multifaceted, originating in
product or service offerings, shelf-space negotiations, supplier contracts, and
investor relations, or access to key capital or resources, to name just a few.

Strategic is a word used today to describe almost every decision and/or action taken,
when in reality there is a clear mix of the no less valuable, tactical decision making
taking place. The generic use of a word such as strategic can diminish its real role
and mask the impact that a true strategic decision has.

If all or a significant number of the preceding elements are present, the greater the
likelihood that the decision is indeed strategic. We want to make it clear that just
because a decision is not strategic does not make it unimportant. Many non-strategic
decisions help to determine the performance of an enterprise in a marketplace,
particularly in the shorter term.

Like many developing fields of inquiry, business and competitive analysis is not
purely art or science, but a combination of substantial portions of both in its effective
application. As with the type of research formally taught to scientists, the analysis
process can be viewed as holding much in common with the scientific method.

Intelligence processes in business organizations have received significant attention

in recent decades. The benefits gained by successfully anticipating a competitors
future plans and strategies are generally self-evident. The consequences of making
decisions based on information that is incomplete, inaccurate, or late are as severe.

Beating competitors, in many industries, has become a necessity rather than a

desirable goal. More insightful strategy development and execution has been
needed since even a decade ago. We would suggest the following reasons are
among the most critical ones underlying increased competition, all of which produce
a greater need for improved business and competitive analysis.
Loss of traditional means of competitive structuring and advantage. Traditionally,
companies could achieve competitive advantage through scale economies, segment
entrenchment, first-mover advantages, and other such industry level gains. While still
present in some sectors, these approaches are now so quickly and easily imitated
that they no longer deliver sustainable advantage.

Contemporary analysts are expected to offer direct and immediate support to resolve
different types of queries, work more closely with their counterparts responsible for
human and technical collection, package their analyses in a variety of new forms,
and deliver them through whatever means are best suited to the recipient.

Generative art is neither programming nor art, in their conventional sense. It is both
and neither of these things. Programming is an interface between man and machine;
it is a clean, logical discipline, with clearly defined aims. Art is an emotional subject,
highly subjective and defying definition.

Modern computer programmers may adopt the same pose as Newton. They spend
their working days entranced before a screen, squinting at a glowing monitor in a
dimmed office, making only the barest micro-movements with their mouse-hand and
keyboard fingers, only vaguely aware of what is beyond the screen, outside the
window, outside the city.